Not your keys, Not your coins

As a new user of read.cash, we are given a set of 12 words and a reminder that we need to save it. This 12 words are known as seed phrase.

I knew that many of the users here in the platform already knew how important to safely save this seedphrase. But for the sake of beginners in the cryptoccurency space, let us find out what is a seed phrase and how to safely store it.

Seed phrase

The seed phrase is a list of words that contains all of the information needed to recover funds from your on-chain wallet (on the blockchain). The seed phrase is created by the wallet software the first time it is used.

In simple terms, it is considered as a password to your cryptocurrency wallet.

As long as you have your seed phrase, you can recocer your funds on that wallet no matter what happened.

For example, the only device you used to access read.cash (with funds in it) have suddenly broken and there is no way you can fix it. No need to worry, as long as you have your seed phrase, you can retrieve all your funds.

How to safely store your seed phrase?

Safely storing your seed phrase can be digital or physical.

Digital storing

1. You can safely store your seed phrase by writing it on a file and encrypt it and save it on your computer.

Pros - easy to do

Cons - Someone might delete your file

2. You can also store your seed phrase on the cloud so you can get access to it on different devices

Pros - easy accessibility

Cons - prone to hackers

3. You can store the file containing your seed phrase into physical hardwares like flash drive, cd, etc.

Pros - safe, easy access

Cons - you might misplaced or lose your physical hardware

Physical storing

1. You can just simply write down your seed phrase on a paper and store

Pros - secured from hackers

Cons - easy to burn, prone to thieves

2. You can write it up on a non flammable material

Pros - the problem with paper wallet is solved

Cons - still vulnerable to thieves

3. You can write it up on different material by pieces and placed it on different storage

Pros - problem with thieves is solved

Cons - what if you misplaced one material where you wrote you seed

Conclusion

Safely storing your seed phrase is easy as 1,2, and 3. There might be some drawbacks but the safest thing to do is have a presence of mind and always be careful.